"That Sour Taste"

Originally published December 2017.

Limbs outstretched

in opposition torn

between staying and leaving.

Ripped apart

by the paradox of desire

that I could have both

at once

the staying

in its love and healing

and the leaving

in its adventure and growth. 

What do you do

when it seems

that somehow there is a gift in

two opposing actions,

parallel universes

that could equally guide you

to the Source,

to that delicate place of depth

where you will be free to suck

all of the marrow

from this rich life?

Goodbye can be a sour thing

to hold in your mouth

during a last embrace,

before a last kiss,

through a last gaze,

You know that it must come out

eventually, or

it will keep your lips pursed like that forever,

subtlety shaking in that painful way they do

when you know you must give up soon,

peel them apart

just enough to

let it slip

out with a whisper

barely audible as tears that have

collected in corners of you mouth

after hiking down the hills of your cheeks

rush in and replace

the sour with salt and sadness.

But you swear if it were up to you,

you could do anything

to make yourself put up with

goodbye’s horrid taste

just a little longer

if that meant

you could

delay its

coming

for

one                                                                      more                                                               second.

Sometimes love looks like staying.

But sometimes love looks like saying

Goodbye

Embracing that sour taste

with open hands,

letting go of expectation

and control

and guarantees,

although keeping them open

takes some prying and prayer and paper weights.

With open hands,

freeing yourself

from the fear that fosters

grasping

and desperation,

clinging, clutching

to a season though you know

the leaves must fall

in order for spring to come again,

for you know that there is

a soil filled with seeds

deep in your spirit

which need space to expand and explode and

lead you into the next right thing.

Goodbye must be said

with open hands

because the people and gifts

that are placed in them

do not belong to us.

They are not our property.

We do not own them.

We are not entitled to keep them forever,

though so often when we feel them changing in our hands,

or preparing to take flight for the winter,

we are tempted to close our fists

and take up arms,

as if we’ve been insulted, or offended

because ‘we deserve to stay in comfort,’

and we resist change

like we resist death

which looks a lot like pretending it’s not there,

but change is kind of like death.

They are both

a form of loss,

and loss

must be grieved.

So there is no grasping in goodbye,

Or projecting a future

expectation of your desired outcome

on the now,

but there is grief,

and you must let go

of a season, or person, or hope,

with radical acceptance that

what you let go of

might not come back,

or if it does,

it might not look the same,

and if that is so,

even still,

there is a gift that awaits in that grief of goodbye,

for through it we allow

that sour taste

to transition into

salt and sadness

and salt and sadness then

provide the contrast needed to

reawaken our senses,

so we might see again the string of sweetness

that is woven through every fiber of our story,

braided into every change,

every loss,

every grief,

and every goodbye.

For eventually, they are all turned into a gift,

if we keep our hands open long enough.

They all become the teacher we need

in due time,

and we can either keep our hands open

in expectation to receive,

or we can close them in fists,

suffocating the life out of that thing

of which we do not want to let go,

shutting ourselves off

from the sweetness

and the gift of change

and grief

and goodbye.

Sometimes love looks like staying

Sometimes love looks like leaving

And sometimes, love looks like saying

Goodbye.

Cheers to the Journey, and may your Spirit always reside in a state of wonder.